Little IBM Help $$

CamelZoo · #1 12-19-2006, 09:35 PM

For the past year or so my IBM T42 notebook has been dying on me. Basically it is now at the point where if I nudge the damn thing, the screen will cut off, and the only way to get it going again will be to hold down the power button, wait 10 minutes, and try again. I have tried hooking it up to another monitor, but if I nudge it or bump it ever so slightly it will just die in the same manner, and the other monitor screen will cut out too.

I have tried every possible thing setting-wise, even turning off the IBM stability control or whatnot. Still no success. I have no idea what the problem is, whether it's the connection to the screen, hard drive, etc etc, and since it's off the 1 yr warranty I'm not quite sure what to do... As you can tell, I am definitely not a computer guy.

Any suggestions would be very much appreciated on any tips to fix it, or if anyone has had or heard of similar problems with laptops or even IBM's. Thanks in advance.

BiPolar_Nut · #2 12-19-2006, 11:37 PM

it's a hardware problem...no setting in the world will fix it.

Sorry. (nidge-reboots was the key)

CamelZoo · #3 12-20-2006, 08:13 PM

do you think should i get an extended warranty from ibm/lenovo for $300 or so and send it to them, or just buy a new laptop?

any part in particular you think is broken?

thanks [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

BiPolar_Nut · #4 12-20-2006, 10:23 PM

tough call....you could drop $300 on a $200 repair, or possibly get the damn thing replaced at +EV.

I've had temperamental screens on laptops that were easy fixes, and I've had stuff that wasn't worth repairing.

If the laptop was recently out of warranty and still semi-new, $300 for an extended warranty may be worthwhile. If it's 5 or 6 yrs old and only has a resale value of $400 then $300 for the extended warranty seems -EV to me.

Best solution is to have a friend that'd rip it apart and diagnose it for next to nothing lol. Outside of that I'm tempted to say chunk it in the garbage and get a new one. You could prolly eBay it as is clearly explaining the current problem for $200 or so....(assuming it's worth $400-$500 if working properly), so the $300 warranty seems like a larger risk to me. I've been sippin the ole whiskey tho, so don't take just my word for it [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[ QUOTE ]
any part in particular you think is broken?

[/ QUOTE ]

could be a stressed wire in the side lights for the screen....in which case you should be able to still see a faint image of what's on screen when it's "dark". Could also be a broken ribbon cable that sends the signal to the screen....which is a $5 part. Could also be something totally unrelated that could cost $1500 to replace like the motherboard. No way to know without ripping it apart. [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

CamelZoo · #5 01-04-2007, 05:37 PM

thanks for the reply, i am going to rip it apart tonight and hope for the best : )

if not i am going to have to scrap it - i might even have to join the dark side, friend is offering me a brand new macbook pro decked out at $1200 which he claims is a $2500 computer. i know next to nothing about macs, and have no clue if they even run poker software, etc